


A Few Notable Instances of Some Terrible Situations in Cloud Strife's Life

by Rellanka



Series: A Year Of Cloudy Skies [78]
Category: Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997), Final Fantasy VII Remake (Video Game 2020)
Genre: Angst, Crack, Fluff and Crack, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-17
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:48:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25326415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rellanka/pseuds/Rellanka
Summary: Cloud never asked for any of this.
Relationships: Roche/Cloud Strife, Sephiroth/Cloud Strife, Zack Fair/Cloud Strife
Series: A Year Of Cloudy Skies [78]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1697269
Comments: 6
Kudos: 125





	A Few Notable Instances of Some Terrible Situations in Cloud Strife's Life

**Author's Note:**

> Timeline of the sections in this fic are roughly that the first is set in Midgar, and the second and third sometime after. This fic goes off the assumption that Zack might begin talking to Cloud through the Lifestream as he does in canon sometimes, and like Sephiroth in one of my (unconnected) Sefikura fics is able to use the Lifestream flowing through the air of Gaia to reach a semi-corporeal state. With Aerith's help, of course!

Terrible Experience #2938 began one night just as Cloud had finally- **finally** \- managed to begin drifting off into sleep. 

Sleep he needed, quite frankly, because between Sephiroth’s voice and that other- admittedly more welcomed one, even if he couldn’t remember the name of the person who owned it- man’s voice annoying him night and day, Cloud had been getting little enough sleep lately. 

So when the shrill ringtone of a phone that wasn’t his rang sharply in the air and dragged him fully back into the waking world, Cloud groaned and tried to bury himself in his pillow. 

“Sephiroth.” He snapped grumpily, “If you’re going to stalk my psyche, the least you can do is put your phone on _silent_.”

“Ah.” A voice that wasn’t Sephiroth’s answered, “I’m… not Sephiroth, but I _am_ terribly sorry for the interruption of you sleep, my friend. I’ll be done with this in a flash.” 

Cloud rolled over in his bed to look at Roche’s slightly bashful face staring back at him from one of the corners of the room, illuminated by the glow of a PHS. 

Cloud blinked, rolled back over and resolved to pretend that his sleep had never been interrupted, because none of what he was seeing could possibly be real. His luck wasn’t _that_ bad.

(For someone who had a man who had made no effort to hide their attraction to him standing at his bedside staring at him, Cloud fell asleep in a rather quick and peaceful fashion. Maybe it was the familiarity of it all.)

***

Terrible experiences just loved to happen in Cloud’s life. Some were truly awful, horrible things that would haunt him until the day he died. Instances where he lost more than he could bare to remember, most days. Instances where he failed. Instances that left their mark. 

Then there were the instances that were still psychologically damaging, but in a very _different_ way. 

One of them began as he was staring darkly at the large, hulking man standing in front of him while nervously rubbing the back of his dark hair. 

“Isn’t it bad enough that _Sephiroth_ keeps popping up to annoy me? Now you have to start taking on a physical form, too?” Cloud didn’t even know who this man was supposed to be, but…. He felt strangely fond of the man. And relaxed, as if he were safe in this presence. 

Whoever this man was, his physical form seemed a little more solid than Sephiroth’s, which was honestly a bit of a surprise. Other people seemed to be able to see him, for one. He’d actually managed to grab the man that had been hitting on Cloud and send him stumbling across the bar, for another. 

He hadn’t said much before he’d thrown the man- just a quick, pseudo-friendly, “’Bought time you headed back to your friends now, buddy.” But that had been enough for Cloud to recognize the sound of the second voice that had been haunting him lately. 

That this was one of his apparitions should be something he could stay angry about- considering that the voices in Cloud’s head had been feeling like they were playing pinball with his psyche for month’s now- but there was something there that wouldn’t let him stay angry at the man in front of him. Even as he was feeling wary over seeing one of his bodiless apparitions given flesh, it was countered with how overjoyed some subconscious part of him was to see the man standing there. 

(Maybe it was just that he felt exceedingly glad that it was this one- and not Sephiroth- who had managed this phenomenon? But, no. That was definitely a part, but… it wasn’t even near the whole.)

And really, he’d been wondering who that second voice was. Wondering why this particular apparition always brought forth such the volatile mix of terribly strong and terribly confusing emotions within him that they did. For the most part Cloud couldn’t pick apart his all of his emotions to try to puzzle out what they each were individually regarding this phantom haunting him, but most days, grief was the strongest. Grief; blazing, and painful, and etching itself right into his heart like a brand that never lost its heat, never stopped burning him alive. An overwhelming grief that was made more painful because it was for a man he couldn’t even remember enough **to** properly grieve. 

He didn’t even know the man’s name. 

Maybe that could be fixed, now. 

He was just opening his mouth to ask, when the man flickered oddly in front of him, almost like when a connection went bad on a tv and the picture lost focus for a bit. 

“Huh. Looks like I still have some work to do before I’ll be able to stick around for very long, Cloud.” The man walked closer to him and stared at him with warm eyes that held Cloud hostage, still and silent as some part of him waited… excitedly(?) for what the man was going to do next. “Sorry about this, buddy, but I gotta catch up to the others. It’s not fair they’ve already got a head start on me, you being able to remember them and all.” 

With a shameless grin, the man slipped both of his hands **under** Cloud’s sword… And planted them **firmly on Cloud’s ass,** giving it a couple of squeezes before they finally released as the man disappeared. 

Cloud could only stare straight ahead in frozen state of horror as all of the impressions of innocence and wholesomeness and goodness he’d had of the man shattered and fell into pieces at his feet. 

And this was why this was this incident was added to the list of terrible things that happened to Cloud. 

***

Sephiroth didn’t even need to _do_ anything for his presence or actions or even the aftershock of his actions to be a Terrible Thing In Cloud’s Life™. 

He just had to be there. 

Like he was right now. 

Dramatically leaning against a nearby wall, _pouting_ at Cloud for some reason Cloud didn’t even want to know the cause of. (And if anyone ever tried to tell Cloud that the great Sephiroth was above things such as pouting- especially the man himself- Cloud would have a grand time laughing in their face for a long time over it.) 

Of course, ignoring him was never going to be something that was going to work, not when Sephiroth was as attention hungry when it came to Cloud as he was. No, after a while Cloud continuing to clean his sword while dedicatedly pretending like he was unaware of Sephiroth’s existence, the man pushed himself from the wall and prowled closer to Cloud with a tiger’s grace. 

Cloud looked up at this, body growing stiff with wariness and one hand going to the sword’s hilt. Lately, Sephiroth had been less threatening than he should be because he wasn’t able to actually touch Cloud; he’d apparently grown tired of using his ‘other’ puppets to do so, some increase in his already insane levels of possessiveness hitting him hard. 

But now that the man behind the other voice had managed the feat of making himself somewhat solid, someone like Sephiroth would likely be able to do the same. 

“You needn’t worry just yet, puppet. Dear Zack decided that he would use his little girlfriend to cheat-“ Sephiroth let his voice trail off slightly to watch Cloud’s reaction, but Cloud was less focused on the odd idea that his second voice had a girlfriend and more focused on the fact that he now had a **name for him** , “so I am as of yet unable to… duplicate his efforts. But don’t worry. It won’t be long before that changes.” 

Cloud hadn’t been worried, thanks. Not at all. 

The lips of the Sephiroth apparition twitched, “So determined to remain apart from me, Cloud, even as you long for me just as I do for you. Stubborn, foolish thing. I look forward to the time when I can prove just how deeply you belong to me.”

“I look forward to the time when I can prove to you, again, that a sword through the heart **hurts**.” Cloud snapped with a dark glower up at the man looming over him, staring down at him as if that were his rightful place. 

Sephiroth threw his head back and laughed, and Cloud continued darkly glaring at that spot for a long time, even after the apparition himself had long disappeared. 

But after a time Cloud stopped glaring, and got back to work on his sword. 

Considering all the men that had been grouped around him lately, he had a feeling that he’d need it sooner rather than later. To remind them all to mind his personal space, if nothing else.

**Author's Note:**

> I love all these characters so much, why do I keep writing them like this? Also, this fic kept wanting to turn really, really dark on me. But the crack fought it, and turned out to be the winner. Writing and editing this one was definitely interesting.


End file.
